The Earth's magnetosphere occupies a region of space in which the Earth's magnetic field dominates the pressure exerted by the solar wind flowing outwardly from the sun. The solar wind includes constantly radiating enormous amounts of energy across the entire electromagnetic spectrum. In addition, the solar wind includes a steady stream of charged particles, such as protons, electrons and neutrons. The magnetosphere is the Earth's geomagnetic field.
The magnetosphere is partially flattened on the sunlit side of the Earth, flattened directly from the pressure applied to the magnetosphere by the solar wind. On the side of the Earth opposite that facing the sun, however, the geomagnetic field is stretched out, past the Earth, for millions of miles. On the sunlit side of the Earth, the geomagnetic field extends past the Earth for less than ten Earth radii.
Adding to the normal energy output from the sun, there are periodic and random solar activities that result in massive increases in ambient energy. The prime events in solar activities are the coronal mass ejection (CME) and the solar flare. A large CME may contain 10 billion tons of matter that is accelerated to several million miles per hour. A solar flare is an explosive release of energy including electromagnetic and charged particles. The energy released is substantial and may be equal to the simultaneous detonation of a trillion five-megaton nuclear weapons.
The Earth's magnetic field deflects some of the solar particles, but at some locations on the Earth, such as above the polar caps, the solar particles interact with the near-Earth environment. However, when strong solar winds sweep past the Earth, they cause shockwaves to ripple through the magnetosphere.
Geomagnetic storms cause rapid fluctuations in the Earth's magnetic field and increase the amount of ionized particles impinging on the Earth's ionosphere. These rapid fluctuations may cause failure of power grids on the Earth, orientation errors in navigation systems relying on magnetic compasses, and sporadic or total blackouts of communication systems. In addition, satellites relying on optical sensors to gaze at stars to maintain orientation in space may be vulnerable to cosmic rays and high-energy protons. These energy protons may produce flashes of light, causing false-star detection and attitude errors with respect to the Earth.
Furthermore, a geomagnetic storm or proton event may physically damage a launch vehicle or its payload. The electrostatic charge deposited on the vehicle may be discharged by onboard electrical activity, such as vehicle commands from a flight control system. In fact, with newer microelectronics and their lower operating voltages, it is actually easier to cause electrical upsets than on older, simpler vehicles.
Due to limitations in available data, such as stratification of ionized species and their dynamics, very little has been done to effectively visualize or even represent dynamics of space weather. Current understanding is primarily limited to insitu measurements of species, tabular specifications of energy doses and capture of solar events. The current visualization of space weather and its dynamics revolve around mathematical modeling and simulation of various parts of the space weather system. The result is a very coarse, limiting and, at times, inaccurate representation of what actually happens. For example, in a Google Earth's depiction of space weather, the Earth's atmosphere is represented as an even spherical cover having color coding depicting energy levels or electron density. The specific ionic species, densities and interactions are not shown, and the resolution of distinguishing patterns are extremely large and cover entire continents at a time.
What is needed is a method and system for gathering sufficient data that is accurate enough to describe and visualize space weather including the volume of species, their dynamics and their geospacial coverage around the globe. The present invention addresses this need.